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Is there such a thing as good taste?

paulgraham.com

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Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#301

Post by abernard1 »

CyberRabbi wrote: post #70
abernard1 wrote: post #15

For once I agree with Paul Graham. I expect his post to be surprisingly unpopular with this crowd, as it sleights a core tenet of our postmodern age. Namely, he's arguing for a form of objective truth and of "the good". A statistical derivation of this good for sure (and qualitative as opposed to a Benthamist, quantitative utilitarianism), but a good nonetheless. But I applaud PG for taking this stance. Truth is not…

While you claim to oppose the postmodern idea that there is no truth, you’ve ceded the premise to the postmodernists by framing truth in their terms of objectivity and subjectivity. The success of the postmodernists was precisely to discredit all “subjective” truths by way of distinguishing them from “objective” truths, which no common person can deny. A stronger position is one that does not require the truth to be…

> While you claim to oppose the postmodern idea that there is no truth, you’ve ceded the premise to the postmodernists by framing truth in their terms of objectivity and subjectivity

I do not. What I am saying is that knowledge—if such a thing exists at all and is worthy of defense by humans—can be addressed in a rational, objective way.

Lots of things are approximations, but we do not deny the existence of categories as useful phenomena or an epistemological tool. To paraphrase a famous exchange of ideas, GB Shaw: "All chairs are quite different" vs. Chesterton: "Well how do you then call them all chairs?"

The postmodernist sleight of hand is to say that perhaps because there are differing contexts that there is not a universal tendency; such a commonality is either non-existent or should be disregarded. They would not categorically discard visceral human experiences that lead to say "thirst" or "hunger" or "anger", but they will claim that there are not common phenomena that engender "awe" or "wonder" or "intrigue". I disagree with that statement. That humans can reliably classify things that are "beautiful" across cultures (and have done so for millenia, even when they hate each others' cultures), shows there is a common tendency towards taste.

When thirsty, many people drink water, but the postmodernist looks at the few drinking Brawndo and has to deny the generalization that water quenches thirst but of thirst entirely.

Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#302

Post by claudiawerner »

pyrale wrote: post #171
fsloth wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if you disagree with "taste-as-a-measure-of-quality-within-a-genre" do you disagree with the concept works of art can be better than other works of art (within a genre) or do you just disagree this non-numerical measure is called 'taste'? What would you call it instead?

I believe Bourdieu's point is that this ability to rank art within a genre is an attribute of belonging to a cultural group. As such, this cultural knowledge you have will be valued depending on the social importance of that group. Some groups will speak highly of a genre while other will despise it. Cultural knowledge will be a more useful capital if it is associated with a more prominent group. Within the group, th…

One interesting point I saw in in a paper on fan cultures was about how taste can serve to continue existing relations with media. That there are people who can understand taste and pick out what's good and worth enjoying, and others cannot. The paper in question applied this to dynamics within the My Little Pony fandom (and Bronies in partciluar).

When the self-identified Bronies were questioned about their enjoyment of the show and its relation to the author's intent, many of them were quite happy to denigrate or take a paternalistic view toward girls' (and children's) entertainment in general.

The authors of the paper pointed out that the narrative of taste (reflected in, say, how the fans described the animation style, voice acting, themes) of the TV show allowed the adult (predominantly male) fans to continue society's general disparagement of childrens' and girls' TV. The adults, the narrative goes, are the ones with taste, who can identify and select what's good, and the girls - the intended audience - have no input. Some paternalistic attitudes involved the idea that the show would teach young girls critical thinking skills, other responses said that the show's quality would teach young girls to appreciate higher quality TV (implicitly, the kind of TV that adult fans approve of, with messages they approve of).

Ironically, this also extended to the author of Season 1 of the show, Lauren Faust - who herself has said that she wanted to create a show that was a break from the typically low quality of girls' entertainment as she saw it.

Taste (and community policing of who has it or can have it) can be a force for exclusion and maintaining hegemony. I think fandom can become a microcosm of what we see play out in a larger scale with highly educated (typically rich) people deciding what media is good and what's bad for the poor.

Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#303

Post by airstrike »

motohagiography wrote: post #205
tompccs wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is very wrong, and the foundation of modernism in art and architecture (which is to say, you are wrong in a very unoriginal way!) The Greeks used all sorts of forced perspective tricks in their architecture. Columns aren't equally spaced and lines aren't straight, but when viewed by a human observer at ground level the buildings built to Greek aesthetic rules appear "nicer" than those built to pure geome…

I replied to another comment related, but the anti- version of modernism is of course post-modernism, where nothing is real and everything is mainly its symbolic value. The conceit of that argument is that aesthetics are somehow trivial because anyone can appreciate them but very few can produce them - whereas you take anything post-modern and everyone can produce them but almost nobody can appreciate them sincerely.…

At the risk of simply repeating what countless others have said elsethread, I must say I thoroughly enjoyed reading your comments on this discussion.

You've managed to scratch a mighty itch that's been bothering me for a long time. I finally have somewhat of a framework to think about it a little more, and I have you to thank for that.

In particular, this bit is pure gold:

> I think po-mo thinkers exist in a simulation founded on that base deception, and they try to convince others that their story (made of language!) is the substrate of our reality, but every time someone gets on a motorcycle, skis down a mountain, prevails over an MMA opponent, hunts food, rides a horse, jumps out of a plane, has sex for pleasure, or has some other peak human experience, the simulation disappears. All the neuroticism that forms the hall of mirrors of false equivalencies, evaporates, and what remains is gravity and time, the physical and the real, and our aesthetic experience of it.

Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#304

Post by golemotron »

handrous wrote: post #224
motohagiography wrote: post #103

Wrote professionally about taste in a previous life. It is related more closely than we expect to techne or competence from physical knowledge. When we think of poor taste, we tend to think of symbols that are separated from their function and meaning, where instead of representing that, "I do this thing," something gaudy says, "I have this thing!" That's what crassness is, and it comes down to our relative apprehens…

> That's what crassness is, and it comes down to our relative apprehension of the real vs. the represented, where typically, something real is powerful independent of who is observing it, and the representation is not. > That difference between effect and affect is one of the sneakiest bits of the english language and perhaps even the culture's most cunningly set trap. Do not underestimate the value of good taste, it…

Interesting take on Fussell. I just realized there's a connection to the taxonomy that Venkatesh Rao uses in the Gervais Principle. Middle class and middle management having the same qualities in relation to their adjacent groups.

Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#305

Post by nikk1 »

lexapro wrote: post #287
jacobolus wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> friend remarked that he didn't think there was any difference, that indeed all scallion pancakes were exactly alike to him. This is entirely plausible. If you are used to eating some food regularly over the course of decades, you will be able to discriminate between good vs. mediocre versions. If you have only eaten a food a few times, the most relevant comparisons will be with other types of food, and you won’t ne…

>When compared to pizza, tacos, or bagels, all scallion pancakes are pretty similar. Bad example, as most pizzas _are_ pretty similar. And in my opinion the best pizzas are not too different from average pizzas. And yes, I had a lot of pizzas in my life, in Naples and elsewhere.

you sir have bad taste in pizza

Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#306

Post by lexapro »

hardwaregeek wrote: post #293
lexapro wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>When compared to pizza, tacos, or bagels, all scallion pancakes are pretty similar. Bad example, as most pizzas _are_ pretty similar. And in my opinion the best pizzas are not too different from average pizzas. And yes, I had a lot of pizzas in my life, in Naples and elsewhere.

And again I ask, really? Because there's a massive difference between a soft, light Naples pizza that's eaten with a fork and a doughy, thick Dominoes pizza and a crispy, salty New York slice and a chewy, deeply roasted Sicilian pizza. Even in New York which I'd hazard is in the top 5 pizza cities in the world, there's a massive difference between Joes Pizza and Lucali.

I see what you mean now. What I meant is that I like Neapolitan pizza, Domino's Pizza, Pizza Hut, New York pizza... pizza is just really great and it's best when I'm hungry.

Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#307

Post by lexapro »

nikk1 wrote: post #305
lexapro wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>When compared to pizza, tacos, or bagels, all scallion pancakes are pretty similar. Bad example, as most pizzas _are_ pretty similar. And in my opinion the best pizzas are not too different from average pizzas. And yes, I had a lot of pizzas in my life, in Naples and elsewhere.

you sir have bad taste in pizza

Or maybe I'm just not picky?

Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#308

Post by mgaunard »

asiachick wrote: post #268
jacobolus wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> friend remarked that he didn't think there was any difference, that indeed all scallion pancakes were exactly alike to him. This is entirely plausible. If you are used to eating some food regularly over the course of decades, you will be able to discriminate between good vs. mediocre versions. If you have only eaten a food a few times, the most relevant comparisons will be with other types of food, and you won’t ne…

Lots of TV shows showing "experts" where they blind taste test them between expensive and cheap wine or expensive vs cheap chocolate and blind folded they can not tell the difference. That is not to say there is no good vs bad wine/chocolate/name your food. But it has nothing to do with price.

I've seen a lot of videos that actually show the opposite. Even I as a non-expert over video can clearly see the difference from thousands of miles away.

The problem might just be that the TV shows you watch are so mediocre they can't even get a real expert.

Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#309

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

zzbzq wrote: post #271
hardwaregeek wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, although this friend is asian american and likely grew up eating scallion pancakes on at least a few occasions. He seemed almost proud of his lack of taste which really surprised me.

Perhaps your friend was signaling a taste you couldn't perceive. For example, I generally look down upon scallion pancakes as a category. Consider an American food analogue. Do I distinguish good and bad grilled cheese? How can I when its identity is that of a basic, unhealthy, cheap, low-class food? If you add more exotic ingredients, it becomes distant from its quintessential identity, so it becomes "good" grilled…

> How can I when its identity is that of a basic, unhealthy, cheap, low-class food

That's an assertion, not a self-evident fact. And one that I (and I am certain, many other people) would dispute.

Re: Is there such a thing as good taste?

#310

Post by bobthechef »

This is where I'd differentiate between taste and beauty. Taste is a property of people. Beauty is a property of things. Taste is the ability to recognize and respond to the beauty of things in proportion to how beautiful they actually are. Thus, taste is ultimately a matter of intellectual refinement. The intellect, property developed, recognizes beauty effectively. Someone with bad taste can be said to either lack discernment (when they cannot tell the difference between the Pietà and some second rate work) or possess disordered tastes (when they show the same estimation or even greater estimation of the inferior to the superior).

Taste is very much related to desirability because what is beautiful is better than which is less so, and what is therefore good is more desirable than which is less so. Just as people can have bad taste, they can have bad desires. Take food, for example. Those who desire mediocre food to the same degree as good food have poor taste and therefore poor desires. Those with a desire to eat glass or their couch cushions (something people with pika might experience) have disordered tastes and therefore disordered desires.

As to the art itself, since art involves mimesis, good art can be measured in part by how well it imitates. (Imitation should not be understood here simplistically as implying photorealism.) An artist who either lacks discernment or lacks technique will produce mediocre imitations. There are feature of art itself which are not exhausted by imitation. These, too, determine whether the artwork itself is good. Composition and proportionality of the artwork itself (and not just the subject) are examples. While the subject may be beautiful, the execution of the artwork may be poor.

Now as PG says, art has an effect on us (indeed, it communicates to us), but because art is artifact and thus lacks an inherent end, its perfection cannot be completely explained without making reference to something with an inherent end which artifacts lack. Human nature is that thing. Human beings individually may possess variable perfections and variable degrees of perfection, including capacity for aesthetic judgement, either because they have either intrinsic individual limitations or because they have not actualized their capacities fully, but one and the same human nature. So we must look to human nature if we want to explain art. Indeed, throughout history, art tracks the understanding of human nature in a given culture. Cultures that understand the dignity of the human person value portraiture in a way those that don't do not.

Aesthetic judgement is value judgement from a different perspective, and therefore a truth claim (the fact-value dichotomy is bogus).

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